“I was serious.  I can’t tell you what I told them.  My words are weapons and have caused enough death.” Bill’s voice was calmer now, surer but still imprinted with some ominous touch of darkness and an endured acceptance of pain. 

They sat, three unlikely companions, around a small, coffee table in Madden’s studio, sipping from chipped, china cups – the storm, the healer, the dispossessed. 

“Words have a time when their meaning is apt and their sentiment precious.  There’s a time to say no, to say thank you, to say I love you, to say I’m sorry…” both Rose and Bill seemed to tremble a little even as even these words kissed the air. “…and words connect with startling power when said at the right time and to the right person.  Bill the time is now and I am the right person,” the Doctor concluded with heartfelt confidence and quiet authority as he braced a firm hand on Bill’s shoulder and ducked into his lower line of sight with a reassuring smile and an air of patience and unsolicited forgiveness.

Bill rose in slow motion and walked heavily to a scuffed wooden trestle table in the corner.  The table was awash with papers and prints, piles that leaned perilously and heaps that had already surrendered to gravity.  What little of the surface that could be seen was pocked with ink stains and chemical reagents, photographer’s tools of the trade.  To the right of the laden surface was a ragged, black, cloth curtain slightly open, revealing glimpses of diffused crimson light, string lines of pegged photographs, containers marked, developer, stop and fixer and a splashed and rusted sink wherein floated immortalised moments of lives.  Newspaper articles and instructive texts and charts were tacked to the wall as well as faded contact test strips and dog-eared pictures.

When Bill turned back he had retrieved an image from the debris which he stroked a reverent thumb over before passing to the Doctor who took it with equally careful fingers.

“Stella,” Bill said simply.

“She’s passed,” the Time Lord answered in understanding.

“Six months,” he coughed back a sob.